[Lingtyp] Query: 'Deceased referent' markers
Dan I Slobin
slobin at berkeley.edu
Fri Sep 27 05:21:27 UTC 2024
Thank you, Nigel, for that observation of individual differences in time
frame. I’ve also noticed cultural differences within the same language.
I’ve always been startled to read a British obituary that begins with “X
has died.” In American papers the norm is “X died.” This is a topic for
another discussion about the impact of subjective orientation on
grammatical choices.
Dan
*<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> *
*Dan I. Slobin *
*Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Psychology and *
*Distinguished **Affiliated **Professor Emeritus of Linguistics*
*University of California, Berkeley*
*email: slobin at berkeley.edu <slobin at berkeley.edu>*
*https://danslobin.academia.edu/research
<https://danslobin.academia.edu/research>*
*https://archive.org/search?query=Slobin&sin=TXT
<https://archive.org/search?query=Slobin&sin=TXT>*
*address: 2323 Rose St., Berkeley, CA 94708, USA*
*<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> *
*I acknowledge that the UC-Berkeley campus is on the traditional, *
*ancestral, and unceded land of the Ohlone people. *
On Thu, Sep 26, 2024 at 20:56 Nigel Vincent via Lingtyp <
lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org> wrote:
> Dear Pattie,
> Alex's post raises a number of interesting points about the use of English
> 'late'. In particular, it's not as stereotyped and frozen in usage as
> Italian *fu *(which, as he and Frans say, is probably a loan from
> French). You find it combined with other adjectives in semi-fixed
> expressions: 'the late and great X', 'the late lamented X', 'the late and
> much-loved X', etc.
> The timing question is also interesting. I had helped to draft a page in
> memory of our colleague Anna Morpurgo Davies, who died ten years ago today (
> https://philsoc.org.uk/anna-morpurgo-davies), and I had written 'our late
> and much admired colleague Anna …'. Some colleagues objected on the grounds
> that ten years was too long for the use of 'late' even if, as Alex
> suggests, there was the dimension of personal affection.
> Best
> Nigel
>
>
> Professor Nigel Vincent, FBA MAE
> Professor Emeritus of General & Romance Linguistics
> The University of Manchester
>
> Linguistics & English Language
> School of Arts, Languages and Cultures
> The University of Manchester
>
>
>
>
> https://www.research.manchester.ac.uk/portal/en/researchers/nigel-vincent(f973a991-8ece-453e-abc5-3ca198c869dc).html
> ------------------------------
> *From:* Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> on behalf of
> Alex Francois via Lingtyp <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> *Sent:* 27 September 2024 1:36 AM
> *To:* Epps, Patience L <pattieepps at austin.utexas.edu>
> *Cc:* lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org
> >
> *Subject:* Re: [Lingtyp] Query: 'Deceased referent' markers
>
> Dear Pattie,
>
> The French equivalent of Eng. *late* is a form *feu*, which precedes an
> NP, whether a proper name or a phrase:
>
> - *J'ai connu feu ton père. *“I used to know your late father.”
> - *C'est la maison de feu Bernard Hervé. *“This is the house of the
> late Bernard Hervé” [fictitious name]
>
> The form is stylistically marked these days, of a legal or literary ~
> higher register. (It is therefore excluded from Pattie's request; but maybe
> worth mentioning anyway.)
>
> In texts, there is historical variation between an earlier adjectival use [*le
> feu roi*] and a later pattern {*feu* +NP} [*feu le roi*].
>
> The French form *feu* happens to be homophonous with the noun *feu* 'fire'
> 🔥🔥 This surely triggers some mental associations between the two notions,
> in the perception of many French speakers (cf. the puns in this newspaper
> entry [lefigaro.fr]
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.lefigaro.fr/langue-francaise/actu-des-mots/2017/12/08/37002-20171208ARTFIG00007-feufeu-n-m-se-dit-de-quelqu-un-qui-s-est-eteint.php__;!!PDiH4ENfjr2_Jw!FTek3sp7uz9cFeh4nXxxWjQFbKwsBclAUgcOT5H8U1W4KFp1nPRm8iy9AhdtpJteA65AVAqnlIgwHF05fpC708p_6IrMxZhs6XjQ8w$>, about
> a singer who passed away in 2017).
>
> However, the homophony is accidental. While the fire noun *feu* comes
> from Lat. *focus* 'hearth' (cf. Ital. *fuoco*), the 'deceased' word
> reflects a Medieval Latin adjective **fatutus* 'who has met their fate' —
> itself derived from *fātum* 'destiny, fate'.
>
> I wonder if *fatutus, or French *feu*, could in fact also be the source
> of Italian *fu* mentioned by Paolo (*il fu Mattia Pascal*). If that *fu* does
> reflect Lat. *fuit* [3sg perfectum of 'be'] as Paolo suggests, the
> similarity with French *feu* would be a coincidence; but the position of
> *fu*, between the article and the noun, suggests an adjectival origin
> rather than verbal.
> _______
>
> The plural of *feu* is *feus* (*nos feus parents*) — contrasting with the
> plural *feux* of the 🔥 noun *feu*.
> The word has a feminine *feue *: *feue la Reine* "the late Queen", from
> *fatuta.
>
> There used to be complex rules of agreement in number & gender, depending
> on the degree of grammaticalisation:
> one would write *la feue Reine* (archaic, adjectival use), but *feu la
> Reine* (when reinterpreted as a non-inflecting particle).
> Those rules are still taught in prescriptive contexts, e.g. on this page
> [btb.termiumplus.gc.ca]
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.btb.termiumplus.gc.ca/tpv2guides/guides/clefsfp/index-fra.html?lang=fra&lettr=indx_catlog_f&page=9wRyescDdDRo.html__;!!PDiH4ENfjr2_Jw!FTek3sp7uz9cFeh4nXxxWjQFbKwsBclAUgcOT5H8U1W4KFp1nPRm8iy9AhdtpJteA65AVAqnlIgwHF05fpC708p_6IrMxZgpTUBb_A$>
> of an official Canadian website.
>
> See also the entry FEU, FEUE [cnrtl.fr]
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.cnrtl.fr/definition/feu__;!!PDiH4ENfjr2_Jw!FTek3sp7uz9cFeh4nXxxWjQFbKwsBclAUgcOT5H8U1W4KFp1nPRm8iy9AhdtpJteA65AVAqnlIgwHF05fpC708p_6IrMxZiv8wSLhw$>
> in the CNRTL dictionary of French [→ second tab on the page]
> [image: image.png]
> According to that entry, a spelling reform in 1901 simplified the
> orthographic rules by promoting number & gender agreement with the noun, in
> all cases (→ *la feue Reine* / *feue la Reine*).
> _______
>
> Finally, an interesting question, both when describing French *feu* and
> when doing a typology of similar forms, would be to find out in what
> precise contexts it is *pragmatically appropriate* to use deceased
> referent markers.
>
> For example, I don't believe it would be natural to say ??{*We visited
> the house of the late Frédéric Chopin*}. Or perhaps this could be said,
> but would bear some particular connotations (perhaps some sense of personal
> affection towards this composer?).
>
> One could think that the criteria may include whether the death is 1/
> "recent", and~or 2/ new information to the hearer. But I don't think this
> captures the whole story. This year I heard a politician speak of *feu
> le Général de Gaulle*, even though he died in 1970 (not so recent), and
> that was not new information to the audience. Perhaps relevant was the
> fact that the referent is of living memory, i.e. there are still some
> people who remember when de Gaulle was alive. It's like you use *feu* (or
> Eng. *late*?) only if you want to underline a personal connection between
> yourself, or your community, and the deceased referent. In the case of the
> politician, the undertext was "*The late Général, whom many of us knew
> and admired during our lifetimes, would disapprove of the current
> political situation if he were still among us today.*" This would not
> work with Napoléon, I think.
>
> Conversely, a death that is really recent, or informationally
> foregrounded, would not be a suitable context for using the marker:
> ??{*Many were killed in the plane crash, including the late pilot*}.
>
> In sum, I'd be curious to know if the pragmatics of using "deceased
> referent" markers tend to be cross-linguistically recurrent, or if they
> differ across languages and cultures. Pattie's description suggests that
> the contexts of use, and frequency, differ between Europe and the Amazon,
> but I wonder in what ways.
>
> best
> Alex
> ------------------------------
>
> Alex François
> LaTTiCe [lattice.cnrs.fr]
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://www.lattice.cnrs.fr/en/alexandre-francois/__;!!PDiH4ENfjr2_Jw!FTek3sp7uz9cFeh4nXxxWjQFbKwsBclAUgcOT5H8U1W4KFp1nPRm8iy9AhdtpJteA65AVAqnlIgwHF05fpC708p_6IrMxZjP3A8xwQ$>
> — CNRS– [cnrs.fr]
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.cnrs.fr/en__;!!PDiH4ENfjr2_Jw!FTek3sp7uz9cFeh4nXxxWjQFbKwsBclAUgcOT5H8U1W4KFp1nPRm8iy9AhdtpJteA65AVAqnlIgwHF05fpC708p_6IrMxZg5d6KNYQ$>ENS
> [ens.fr]
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.ens.fr/laboratoire/lattice-langues-textes-traitements-informatiques-et-cognition-umr-8094__;!!PDiH4ENfjr2_Jw!FTek3sp7uz9cFeh4nXxxWjQFbKwsBclAUgcOT5H8U1W4KFp1nPRm8iy9AhdtpJteA65AVAqnlIgwHF05fpC708p_6IrMxZiPGfikyA$>
> –PSL [psl.eu]
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.psl.eu/en__;!!PDiH4ENfjr2_Jw!FTek3sp7uz9cFeh4nXxxWjQFbKwsBclAUgcOT5H8U1W4KFp1nPRm8iy9AhdtpJteA65AVAqnlIgwHF05fpC708p_6IrMxZiI-5P99g$>
> –Sorbonne nouvelle [univ-paris3.fr]
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://www.univ-paris3.fr/lattice-langues-textes-traitements-informatiques-cognition-umr-8094-3458.kjsp__;!!PDiH4ENfjr2_Jw!FTek3sp7uz9cFeh4nXxxWjQFbKwsBclAUgcOT5H8U1W4KFp1nPRm8iy9AhdtpJteA65AVAqnlIgwHF05fpC708p_6IrMxZitg1hAQQ$>
> Australian National University [researchers.anu.edu.au]
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://researchers.anu.edu.au/researchers/francois-a__;!!PDiH4ENfjr2_Jw!FTek3sp7uz9cFeh4nXxxWjQFbKwsBclAUgcOT5H8U1W4KFp1nPRm8iy9AhdtpJteA65AVAqnlIgwHF05fpC708p_6IrMxZgRudjmfw$>
> Personal homepage [alex.francois.online.fr]
> <https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://alex.francois.online.fr/__;!!PDiH4ENfjr2_Jw!FTek3sp7uz9cFeh4nXxxWjQFbKwsBclAUgcOT5H8U1W4KFp1nPRm8iy9AhdtpJteA65AVAqnlIgwHF05fpC708p_6IrMxZic53gvSg$>
> _________________________________________
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ---------
> From: *Paolo Ramat via Lingtyp* <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> Date: Thu, 26 Sept 2024 at 16:00
> Subject: Re: [Lingtyp] Query: 'Deceased referent' markers
> To: 양재영 <tastymango at snu.ac.kr>
> Cc: Epps, Patience L <pattieepps at austin.utexas.edu>,
> lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
>
>
> Dear Pattie,
> the title of a novel by the Nobel Prize winner 1934 Luigi Pirandello * is
> Il fu Mattia Pascal ,*whereby* fu (*< Lat. *fuit *3rd sg of the perfect),
> preceded by the ART* il, *has exactly the same adjectival function as Engl*.
> late *or Port.* finado, *both preceded by ART.
> An NP such as* *I fu Mattia e Giovanni *would be ungrammatical, since *
> fu *wouldn't agree with the plural *Mattia + Giovanni *(though *I* *furono
> (*< Lat. *fuerunt *3rd plur. of the perfect) *Mattia e Giov. * would
> sound very strange: *Fu, *still used in NPs such as *Il fu Mattia Pascal* ,
> is a stereotyped formula, just as the corresponding Engl. and Port.
> expressions.
>
> Best wishes,
> P.Rt.
>
> Prof. Dr. Paolo Ramat
> Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Socio corrispondente
> 'Academia Europaea'
> 'Societas Linguistica Europaea', Honorary Member
> Università di Pavia (retired)
> Istituto Universitario di Studi Superiori (IUSS Pavia) (retired)
>
> piazzetta Arduino 11 - I 27100 Pavia
> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/piazzetta+Arduino+11+-+I+27100+Pavia?entry=gmail&source=g>
> ##39 0382 27027
> 347 044 98 44
>
>
> Il giorno gio 26 set 2024 alle ore 13:08 양재영 via Lingtyp <
> lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org> ha scritto:
>
> Dear Pattie Epps,
>
> Tübatulabal (Uto-Aztecan, California) uses a nominal ‘past tense’ suffix
> -pï- to mark the death of a person (including kins).
>
> The language also has a suffix -bai’i- that is used with a kinship term to
> indicate the kin being referred to is the last surviving one, and a few
> other interesting phenomena of expressing the death of the ‘connecting
> relative’.
>
> Reference:
> Voegelin, Charles F. 1935. Tübatulabal Grammar. University of California
> Press.
>
> Best regards,
> Jaeyeong Yang
>
> 2024년 9월 26일 (목) 오후 7:30, Pun Ho Lui via Lingtyp <
> lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>님이 작성:
>
> Dear Pattie Epps,
>
> Narragansett (Algic) is claimed to have a suffix called “absentative”
> which can encode a deceased person or lost possessions, e.g. nókac-i ‘my
> late deceased mother’ (mother-ABSENTATIVE).
>
> Reference:
>
> O’Brien, Frank Waabu. 2009. Grammatical Studies in the Narragansett
> Language (Second Edition). Aquidneck Indian Council.
>
>
> Warmest,
>
> *Pun Ho Lui Joe*
>
> Epps, Patience L via Lingtyp <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org> 於
> 2024年9月26日 下午6:14 寫道：
>
> Dear all,
>
> I'm writing regarding a phenomenon that appears to be widely attested in
> Amazonian languages, which my project collaborators and I have been calling
> a 'deceased referent marker'. We are wondering about the extent to which a
> comparable phenomenon exists in other languages of the world - from a
> preliminary survey, it appears to have very few close correlates elsewhere.
>
> The Amazonian-type DRM construction involves using a particular linguistic
> marker (which can usually be identified as more grammatical than lexical,
> though it's not always an easy distinction to make) within the noun phrase
> when making direct reference to a deceased referent. This is reminiscent of
> what occurs in some European languages (e.g. English *the late John, *
> Portuguese *o finado João*), but tends to be less lexical and is
> ubiquitous in discourse, rather than being highly optional and/or limited
> to more formal registers. In some languages, the DRM is a distinct etymon
> with no other functions; in others, it overlaps with other functions (most
> frequently that of a nominal past marker). It is always used with humans
> (primarily proper names and kin terms), while some languages also allow use
> with non-human referents. In spite of these variations, there seem to be
> close parallels in how the construction is formulated and how it is used
> discursively across many Amazonian languages.
>
> An example from Nadëb (Naduhup family, NW Brazil):
> *ee makũuh ỹ haw'ëëh doo
> paah*
> father DRM 1sg raise
> NMLZ PST
> 'It was my late father who raised me (there).'
>
> In defining the Amazonian 'type' of DRM, we are focusing on resources that
> a) consist of a morphological element (affix or clitic hosted by the noun);
> or b) if arguably more lexical, have a ‘deceased referent’ function that is
> relatively distinct from other meanings/morphosyntactic expressions and/or
> appears ubiquitously in DRM contexts. We are excluding other kinds of
> linguistic strategies for referring to the deceased, including naming
> prohibitions, necronyms (passing on the deceased's name to a child), more
> pragmatically optional periphrastic strategies (e.g. 'my dead relative',
> 'my relative who died recently', etc.). We are also excluding (though we're
> interested, for comparative purposes) other types of nominal morphology
> relating to the deceased, e.g. a marker that occurs with a kin term X to
> mean ‘one whose X has recently died’ in Kayardild (Australia):
> *kangku-kurirr* (father’s.father-DEAD) ‘one whose father’s father has
> recently died’ (Evans 1995: 197).
>
> We'd be very grateful for information about comparable phenomena in
> languages outside South America.
>
> All best,
> Pattie Epps
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
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